The Grace Not to Hide

It is part of human nature perhaps to hide from our mistakes. A child who breaks something might try to hide the evidence, hoping to not get caught, or will hide themselves, delaying the moment that they will. We adults are often not much better. We avoid those with whom we have had disagreements, and we’d rather make excuses than admit our faults.

This is not a new problem. In today’s first reading, we hear that our first parents behaved the same way with God when they broke the one commandment he had given them. If we struggle with understanding why this was so terrible, it’s important to focus less on the action itself – eating the fruit of a particular tree – and more on what the action was: blatant disobedience. And what’s more, it wasn’t like the disobedience of a child; Adam and Eve had greater powers of intellect and will than we have, and so they truly *knew* what they were doing went against everything they had been given by their friend, the God with whom they dwelled in the garden. And so, having been deceived, having realized their sin, Adam and Eve hide in shame and fear from God.

The rest of the reading is really about God’s mercy. He seeks out his sinful creatures, not to destroy them as he could have done, but to assure them that all is not lost. It is true that their sin has some definite ramifications. They have to leave the paradise of the garden, and as a result of their sin, things that weren’t originally part of God’s creation enter the world: sin, concupiscence, suffering, and death. But, despite their infidelity, and despite ours too, God does not abandon us. In fact, we might say that the rest of history is God’s great rescue mission to save human beings from sin and death.

Today we celebrate the feast which marks the first glimmer of God’s plan of salvation coming at last to its culmination. Long before Jesus died and rose again in Jerusalem, or was born in Bethlehem, or was announced by an angel in Nazareth, his Blessed Mother was herself conceived without sin in the womb of her mother. In other words, from the moment of her conception, Mary was Immaculate, and that spotlessness stayed with her throughout her life, the free gift of grace from God that accorded completely with her will. We often think of Mary’s most glorious moment as her fiat to the angel Gabriel – her response, “Let it be done to me according to God’s word.” And while it was indeed the shining moment of her faith and her humility for the Lord’s plan, it was also possible because she was, as the angel said, “full of grace.” It was God’s gift of grace from the moment of her conception that made it possible for her to say “Yes” to being the Mother of our Lord. 

The Immaculate Conception (c. 1628) by Peter Paul Rubens

This truth of Mary’s life has significance not just for what we believe but also how we live. The serpent had told Eve that disobedience would make her “like God”; but that was a lie. It only led to shame and hiding, and all of humanity suffered as a result. Sin is always that way; whatever attraction it holds in the moment, it always is a letdown, an illusion. And yet God does not abandon us, but he offers us his grace anew. Through her obedience made possible by God’s gift of grace, Mary received what Adam and Eve had desired – to be like God, and even more, to become the Mother of God, and all of humanity has benefited as a result. So too in our lives, God’s grace never restricts our freedom; rather, it perfects it, and it makes it possible for us to obediently follow his will – so that we can be like him in this life and even live with him in the next.

Friends, in a few weeks we will celebrate the birth of our Savior, but we can be celebrate already today the grace of Christ which redeems us – the grace given to Mary at the moment of her Immaculate Conception, and the graces he offers to us as well. May we never hide from the Lord but allow him to find us, to make us whole, to give us his grace anew, so that like Mary, we can glorify him in all that we do.